I was aware that PETA practically runs death camps for animals. This is why their sheer hypocrisy is dripping everywhere, like claiming Pokemon would make kids treat animals like Pokemons. Hey, atleast they're not slaughtering Pokemons in the game... like PETA does to actual animals.
That Pokemon flash game illustrates something important about PETA. In the games and cartoon it's heavily implied that Pokemon enjoy fighting. Proving themselves in combat, bonding with their trainers, these are things Pokemon aspire to and enjoy. The best analogy I can come up with is a sheep dog herding sheep. It's basically their calling in life, what they're bred to do.
I don't think PETA understands this even in real life. They don't like to see animals working with humans, even though most of these animals have been bred for generations for that specific purpose. As I recall they don't even approve of guide dogs for the blind. It's fucked up.
What's so fucking hysterical about PETA's little Pokemon game is the delicious irony. PETA's game, "Pokemon Black and Blue," was a "parody" of Pokemon Black and White. In Black/White, the main villains are
Team Plasma, who are an
animal wrongs group. Their mission is to separate people and Pokemon entirely and force Trainers to release their Pokemon back into the wild. They think that people and Pokemon should live separate lives, and that basically all Trainers are awful, regardless of whether their Pokemon are actually unhappy. Despite demanding that people release their Pokemon, they themselves use Pokemon to achieve their goals. A lot of Team Plasma members actually forcibly kidnap Pokemon from their Trainers, hypocritically keep the Pokemon for themselves, and decry perceived abuse by Trainers while
actually abusing Pokemon. To top it all off, the whole thing is actually a sham by most of the group's leadership (although the lower ranks don't know anything about it); if everyone's convinced to separate from Pokemon, then nobody can oppose them when
they use Pokemon to take over.
The game itself actually challenges Plasma on their goals; the entire theme of the game is that nothing is in black and white and that people need to learn how to see the world through another's eyes. Most characters conclude that, even if they are acting out of concern and love for Pokemon, Team Plasma's ultimate goal of separating people and Pokemon entirely would be very damaging to both. After traveling around and interacting with the player character, N, Team Plasma's king, realizes that most Trainers adore their Pokemon and that their Pokemon adore them in return, meaning that separating them would be cruel and heartbreaking. Even though there are people who abuse and take advantage of Pokemon, most people treat them with love and respect and don't deserve to be punished. The conclusion of the game basically states that the world isn't black and white, extremism is never the answer, and people need to learn how to work together to accomplish things instead of holding an "us vs them" mentality; Team Plasma's ultimate goal may have been noble (even if it was all a sham), but they were approaching it in an entirely wrong way.
Tl;dr- Team Plasma is basically the PETA of the Pokemon world.
PETA made a parody of a game in which the player is fighting a team of villains doing essentially the same thing they’re doing in real life. And I don’t think they even realized it.
